Gay Tours Finally Hit Boom Time

September 27, 1992|By CHRISTOPHER REYNOLDS, Los Angeles Times

About eight years ago, a couple of Minneapolis travel professionals named Kevin Mossier and Jack Sroka had what seemed to them a great idea: They`d find a cruise ship, charter it for a week and market the cruise as a vacation getaway exclusively for gay men.

The two called a cruise company and set up a meeting. But when the cruise officials heard the specific nature of the charter group, Sroka recalls, ``the smiles froze on their faces. They couldn`t get that meeting over with quick enough.``

Times have changed. Mossier shrugged off that rejection, found a willing cruise company and built RSVP Travel Productions into a profitable Minneapolis enterprise, with seven charter cruises on the company`s 1992 schedule and a big billboard in West Hollywood, Calif.

Last year, the company bought its own ship at a U.S. government auction. And this December, the 100-berth Seaspirit will make its maiden voyage as this country`s first year-round, all-gay cruise ship.

This is no isolated success story. Throughout the travel industry, gay vacationers have become a prime marketing target and scores of special- interest companies have started to serve them. Many, but not all, are gay- owned.

The International Gay Travel Association, a Key West, networking organization of travel agents and other professionals, was founded in 1983 with about 40 members. Since then, membership has grown to 125 in 1987, 385 in 1990 and about 585 now, said board member Andy Schmiedel.

The enterprises range from luxury cruises to safaris, the destinations from Charleston to Mykonos. Every spring, thousands of lesbians converge on Palm Springs in an informal celebration inspired by, but not formally associated with, the Nabisco Dinah Shore LPGA golf tournament there.

``It`s really kind of amazing,`` says Marianne Ferrari, a Phoenix-based publisher of guidebooks for gay and lesbian travelers. ``We can hardly get over the increases we`ve had in our listings. It`s doubling every year and it`s only in the last five years that it has exploded like that.``

Her Phoenix firm, Ferrari Guidebooks, publishes four guidebooks aimed primarily at gay and lesbian travelers in the United States, Europe and Canada. The 1991 edition of Ferrari`s $14.95 accommodation guide, Inn Places, lists about 1,200 gay and ``gay-friendly`` hotels and inns worldwide, travel agents and other resources. Next year`s is likely to include 1,400 hotel and inn entries if the current boom continues.

Private businesses aren`t the only ones vying for the attention of gay travelers. Earlier this summer, the Netherlands Tourism Bureau opened an international campaign that targets gay travelers and include ads in such prominent U.S. gay publications as The Advocate. Palm Springs` tourism division in December co-sponsored a familiarization tour for about a dozen writers from gay and lesbian publications nationwide.

At Our World magazine, a three-year-old publication that bills itself as the nation`s only gay and lesbian travel magazine, advertising director Richard Valdmanis estimates circulation at 17,000 and rising. He also notes that when ads for U.S. accommodations come in, ``it`s not exclusively Key West, Provincetown, Palm Springs and San Francisco anymore. Places are opening up in places like Charleston, S.C.``

Another promoter of self-contained gay or lesbian tours is San Francisco- based Africatours , which early this year announced it was organizing gay safaris built around photography opportunities in Kenya.

``There`s not so much homophobia any more,`` says Africatours manager Andy Harris. ``Everybody is more accepting of different people`s lifestyles. And you can advertise for these kind of things in the straight press, and not get adverse reactions from people.``